The Korean family of the future

By Mark Peterson

The Korean family is changing. That might be the understatement of the decade. Given that fact, then what is it going to change into? It's hard to predict things like this, but there are some signs we can use for our divination.

The impending formative issue is the low birth rate. Government leaders have proposed cash payments and loans to encourage people to have more children. I wrote last month about my observation that easier home buying might help ― and my article brought me several responses. Some agreed with me that home financing and home buying in Korea are more difficult than they should be. But others argued that deep attitudinal changes are necessary. Therein lies the rub. Deep attitudinal changes are hard to change.

Nevertheless, let's look at the changes that have taken place and see if there might be any hope for the future. The most dramatic social or familial change I've seen has been, first, universal birth control and the attitude shift from the desire to have many children to the norm of having only two. Second has been the shift away from the "son preference."

This second shift came in response to another social crisis, an unfortunate social activity that saw rampant selective abortions of female fetuses. When the technology developed whereby a couple could determine the gender of a baby early in the pregnancy, Koreans began aborting female fetuses. The problem came to stare society in the face when children showed up at school, with large numbers of boys and small numbers of girls. In one conservative rural area, it was reported that an incoming class of kindergarteners was all boys.

Such a glaring imbalance screamed the question, "Who are these boys going to marry?"

In answer to the question, Korean society did an about-face, and today not only are girls born in natural ratios, but there is an openly stated preference for girls. "A daughter will take better care of you when you get older, than will a daughter-in-law," it is often heard.

This change in family structure was also accompanied by the move from single-story or two-story homes, to apartment living. I remember one of my colleagues stating her own pleasure at moving into an apartment (in the 1980s) where she could live separately from her in-laws. Freedom, in a word, was the way she looked at it.

These changes that I have witnessed have been remarkable, and certainly unexpected. Therefore, I have faith that Korean society as a whole has the ability to see what's ultimately good for society and will shift gears away from the low birth rate lifestyle that plagues Korea today. I hope.

What will the family of the future look like? One other factor we have already seen will help us to look into the future, and that is the dismantling of the male-dominated inheritance system and social orientation. We have seen in the past that the men have dominated ― this is seen in son preference, registration at the neighborhood office only under a male household head, the opening of high-prestige employment based on gender-neutral tests (we've commented before that 70 percent of those who pass the foreign service exam are females), and in many other ways, too. All of these measures can be seen as the dismantling of the "bugye" social order ― the patrilineal (or, if you like, patriarchal) system. Ancestor ceremonies are on the decline ― in numbers and elaboration. Meeting at the "keunjip" ― home of the ancestral heir ― is on the decline. Most Koreans today recognize that the bugye system is in the rear-view mirror.

What will replace it? One answer is "that which preceded it." The alternative to the bugye system is not the "mogye" system. Matrilineality (or matriarchy) did not precede patrilineality. Rather, prior to the late 17th century, Korea had a balanced system of family and social order. Inheritances were equally divided between sons and daughters. Marriage was both matrilocal (uxorilocal ― or jangga-ganda) as well as patrilocal (or sijip-ganda). The somewhat egalitarian nature of society preceded the male-dominated takeover in the late 17th century. We can call it a "bilateral" family system ― and that is what needs to be established in the future.

When I ask Korean audiences what preceded bugye society, the response is always mogye society. Wrong. The first step Korea needs to take to understand options for the future is to better understand the past ― this is your history teacher speaking.

One of the most graphic symbols of the dismantling of the bugye system will be the new approach to "jokbo" ― genealogy. When Koreans stop tracing ancestry through only the male line ― when they start tracing the ancestry of their mothers and grandmothers as well as their fathers and grandfathers, you will know they truly have left the male-dominated bugye society in the rear-view mirror.

These are some of the indicators we can look for to see if Korea will happily adjust to a new social order. Does this answer the problem of the low birth rate? Maybe not directly, but it will show recognition of a new and different way to look at family, and maybe in the shift, people will see that for life to go on, we need children. Korea has adjusted well to social needs in the past. Let's hope they can do it in the future.

Mark Peterson (markpeterson@byu.edu) is a professor emeritus of Korean, Asian and Near Eastern languages at Brigham Young University in Utah.